Maine’s public advocate wants to dig into utility billing data to find out how much low-income ratepayers are overcharged by competitive electricity providers.

Following a report last year that said ratepayers paid $135 million more over seven years to competitive electricity providers than they did for the standard offer, Public Advocate Heather Sanborn wants details about the cost burden on low-income ratepayers.

The Legislature restructured the state’s electric industry in 2000 by ending the generation side of the business for utilities, leaving them to deliver electricity. For the supply of electricity, consumers may choose the standard offer rate or a competitive electricity provider such as Electricity Maine.

The standard offer is set by the Public Utilities Commission and is the default rate. It’s the choice of most households and small-business customers.

Competitive electricity providers have been under fire for years by the state Office of the Public Advocate over their marketing and pricing practices. Often, their rates start lower than the standard offer but surpass the default rate over time.

Sanborn, who represents utility ratepayers, is seeking state legislation authorizing the PUC to direct the utilities to provide ZIP code data to study the “disproportionate impact” of competitive electricity provider rates on low-income customers. A proposed amendment to the legislation is being revised, her office said.

Sanborn said her office needs ZIP-code level billing data from Central Maine Power Co. and Versant Power to compare the rates being charged to low-income customers of competitive electricity providers versus low-income customers who accept the standard offer rate. The utilities bill residential customers and disburse the money to the competitive electricity suppliers.

The PUC in July denied a request by the public advocate to authorize CMP and Versant to provide data about electricity supplied by competitive electricity providers “to better understand the impact of  retail choice” on consumers. Regulators said the public advocate does not have statutory authority to investigate competitive electricity providers’ rates “in relation to obtaining the confidential data requested.”

Enrollment in the Low-Income Assistance Program will probably be used to identify low-income ratepayers in a study by the Office of the Public Advocate, Sanborn said. Households at or below 150% of the federal poverty level, or about $48,000 a year for a family of four, are eligible for the low-income assistance program.

The legislation has bipartisan support, including from Rep. Melanie Sachs, D-Freeport, and Sen. Mark Lawrence, D-York, who are the chairs of the Energy, Utilities and Technology Committee.

The Maine State Chamber of Commerce opposes the legislation. Ashley Luszczki, the chamber’s government relations specialist, told the committee Tuesday that the legislation would be an “unproductive step to regulate the competitive electricity market and would potentially create unintended consequences.”

Competitive electricity providers already provide reports to the PUC, which oversees and regulates the businesses, she said. The PUC could respond to concerns about competitive electricity providers’ rates or practices by conducting a “limited scope review” instead of adding more oversight and business regulation, Luszczki said.

Information that the legislation would require to be disclosed to the public advocate could force competitive electricity providers to disclose proprietary pricing information, contract details and strategic business information, she said.

“While transparency is important, keeping sensitive business information confidential is of the utmost importance,” Luszczki said.

Steven Hudson, a Portland lawyer representing NRG Energy Inc., a competitive electricity provider, told lawmakers that a pending amendment to the legislation would leave the authority to compel information with the PUC, which issues orders protecting confidentiality.

The PUC, state laws and the attorney general, using the Maine Unfair Trade Practices Act, have authority to strip “habitual offenders” of the right to do business in the state, he said.

“We have very strong tools that we could use,” Hudson said. “We just need to find the will to enforce those rules.”

From 2016 to 2023, the electricity providers charged Maine’s households $135 million more for electricity than what would have been billed under the standard offer, according to a December report by the Electric Ratepayer Advisory Council. Sanborn cited the report in her testimony to the committee.

William Harwood, who was public advocate until January, battled competitive electricity providers over marketing and pricing practices and called for phasing out the market, saying it doesn’t work as envisioned when electricity was deregulated in Maine in the early 2000s. He also called for revoking Electricity Maine’s license to do business in the state over accusations it overcharged customers as much as 50% more than the rate set by the PUC.

State regulators ordered the company to refund $6 million to about 20,000 current and former customers and pay a $315,000 penalty. Electricity Maine was founded in Auburn in 2011 and bought in 2016 by Spark Energy Inc. of Houston.